If your chihuahua starts slipping and sliding on your floors, it may be because his paw pad hair has grown too long. Long paw pad hair can cause your pet to lose traction on slippery floor, and can also collect ice, burrs, and pine sap. If you’d like to learn how to shave paw pads at home, this guide is for you.
What you’ll need:
At the minimum, you will need a pair of clippers. If you’re using a set with a detachable blade, you’ll need either a #40F or a #10F blade, depending on your preference. Although it is optional, paw pad cream is a nice addition since it can help keep your dog’s paw pads from cracking.
How to Shave the Paw Pads
If you are using a detachable blade, make sure the correct blade is on, and your clippers are plugged in. You don’t want to get an uncooperative dog up on your workspace only to discover you need to fiddle around with the clippers!
Holding your dog under your elbow with his butt sticking out in front of you is the easiest way to hold them steady while still having access to their feet.
Pick up a foot, and starting closest to the nails, gently skim across the top of the paw pads. You want the flat part of the blade to be level with the pad. If you want to gently scoop out the big pads on your chihuahua you can do a shallow scoop, but don’t scoop too deeply or you may cut the webbing between the toes.
Personally, I seldom scoop these out because I want some paw pad hair to protect the interior of the foot. I just want them to have traction.
Once you’ve finished, repeat on all the other feet, and now you’re dog’s paw pads should have good traction once again.
Now is a good time to check for paw problems
Although you have successfully shaved your dog’s feet, there’s still a few optional things you can do. One of those things is to look at the paw pads as you are grooming them. Do you see any burns from hot pavement? Cuts from ice? Are they cracking, or dry?
Big problems often start out with small problems. If you notice an issue when taking care of their feet you can provide treatment before it becomes so bad it needs a veterinarian to fix it.
Severe sunburns and injuries should see a vet for treatment. They can easily become infected or made worse by your pet licking them. If the paw pads are dry however, you can provide treatment at home with paw pad cream.
Paw pad cream is a moisturizing balm (affiliate link) that works to stop cracking and moisturize your dog’s feet. There’s a wide variety of them on the market. We’ll go over the different kinds and what a good option for your pet may be in a later post.
Similar Posts:
- Review of oneisall Paw Pad Clippers
- Review of the Andis AGC2 UltraEdge
- How to Trim Your Chihuahua’s Nails
- How to Clean Your Chihuahua’s Ears
- How to Deshed Your Chihuahua
[…] (or you are a dog groomer) getting one of these is overkill. You don’t need to spend almost $200 to tidy up feet. These are good if you need to do full grooms on your dog, including feet, sani and a full body […]
[…] a dog groomer) getting one of these is overkill. You don’t need to spend almost $200 to tidy up feet. These are good if you need to do full grooms on your dog, including feet, sani and a full body […]